What Does 2 Samuel 10:4 Mean?
So Hanun took David's servants, and shaved off half of their beards, and cut their garments at the middle, to their buttocks, and sent them away.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Wherefore Hanun took David’s servants, and shaved off the one half of their beards, and cut off their garments in the middle, even to their buttocks, and sent them away.THE KEY
The beard shares a root with “elder,” while the cut garment turns covering into exposure: the humiliation attacks both visible age and bodily privacy.
THE MEANING
The verse shows how humiliation can be imposed through the body: a visible sign of age is partly removed, and the garment is cut so the men are exposed. They are then sent away in that condition, carrying the insult beyond the moment of violence.
THE ROOT
זְקָנָם
zĕqānām
GROWS FROM
זקן
z-q-n
To be old or grow old.
“beards” in this verse is zĕqānām. The word for beard shares its root with the word for an elder. English can make the shaving sound like a matter of grooming; the Hebrew also links the beard to visible age and mature standing.
ALSO GROWS
zaqan: Beard.
זָקָן
This is the word in the verse; half of each beard is removed.
zaqen: Elder; old man.
זָקֵן
Its shared root links the beard to age and the standing associated with it.
וַיִּכְרֹת
wayyikrot
GROWS FROM
כרת
k-r-t
To cut or sever.
“cut” in this verse is wayyikrot. The verb makes the damage a severing of the garment itself. A piece of clothing meant to cover becomes the means by which the men are exposed.
ALSO GROWS
karat: To cut; cut off.
כָּרַת
This is the root verb used for cutting their garments.
keritut: A dismissal or divorce; literally, a cutting off.
כְּרִיתוּת
This related noun carries the root’s sense of separation or severance.
וַיְשַׁלְּחֵם
vayshalleḥem
GROWS FROM
שלח
sh-l-ḥ
To send forth, release, or stretch out.
“sent them away” in this verse is vayshalleḥem. The final act uses the root שָׁלַח (shalach, send or release). Here the men are sent forth after being stripped and exposed, so the sending takes the form of coercive expulsion.
ALSO GROWS
shalach: To send, send forth, or release.
שָׁלַח
This is the root of the verse’s final action: Hanun sends the men away.
mishloach: A sending, dispatch, or outstretching.
מִשְׁלוֹחַ
This related noun preserves the root’s movement outward, which here follows the humiliation.
THE PATTERN
A body’s covering marks whether a person is exposed in shame or clothed in restored dignity.
And the eyes of them both were opened, and they perceived that they were bare, and they sewed fig leaves together, and made for themselves waistcloths.I will exult greatly in the LORD; my living soul shall leap in my God; for he has clothed me in garments of deliverance, he has wrapped me in the robe of alignment, as a bridegroom dons a headdress, and as a bride binds on her jewels.But the father said to his servants, "Quickly, bring out the first robe and put it on him, and give a ring into his hand and sandals onto his feet."THE THREAD
In that day the Lord shall shave with a hired razor, from beyond the river, by the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet, and the beard shall also be swept away.Isaiah also names זָקָן (zaqan, beard) as something shaved away. Its root, זקן (z-q-n, age or growing old), also appears in זָקֵן (zaqen, elder), linking the visible beard here to age and mature standing.
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